Friday, January 4, 2008

10 Things a Political Junkie Hates About Politics

Townhall.com::10 Things a Political Junkie Hates About Politics::By John Hawkins
* Fear Of Offending Anyone: Because politicians are always thinking about the next election instead of actually serving the people who put them into office, they're terrified of actually doing anything that might offend someone.
* Politics Not Stopping At The Water's Edge: There's nothing wrong with disagreeing with your political opponent's foreign policy, but there is a problem when you put your petty political concerns ahead of the good of the country.
* The Lying And Inauthenticity: Campaigns in the United States have become exercises in trying to be "everything to everybody."
* Crazed Hyperbole: On the Left, comparisons of Bush to Hitler and wild claims that the United States is a fascist dictatorship have become so commonplace as to be blasé.
* Fake Objectivity From The Media: If Townhall claimed it was a neutral outlet despite having all rightward leaning pundits and having a staff that's almost wholly conservative, would anyone believe them? Of course not. But, mainstream media outlets -- where Democrats outnumber Republicans 10 to 1, liberals dominate the Op-ED pages, and the news is heavily slanted against conservatives -- regularly claim to be unbiased.
* Mainstreaming Conspiracy Theories: Off-the-wall crazy has become just another form of political expression.
* The Perpetual Campaign: We've gotten to the point that actual governance is being treated as markedly less important than campaigning.
* Short-Term Thinking: Social Security is going to go into the red within a decade, Medicare costs are unsustainable, we're running a massive debt every year, and no matter how often the America people demand it, very little is being done to secure our borders or put an end to illegal immigration.

Where's the long term thinking? Where are the people working to build a country that will be better for our children than it is for us? Where is the concern for the long-term health of the country?
* Lack Of Bipartisanship: I'm all for two-fisted partisanship and trying to beat the other side's brains out in the political arena, but things have gotten a little too far out of hand when we've got people cheering the deaths of their political opponents, comparing them to Hitler, falsely claiming that almost every election is rigged, and trying to prevent opposing views from being heard at all on college campuses.
* The Primary System Is Broken: We now have gotten into a position where we have politicians campaigning for the presidency for a full year -- after which, we have all the primary states jammed together so closely that the race will probably be over in less than a month.


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